Firefighters Warn Neighbors Who Try Entering Burning Home

(Shelby County, TN) Firefighters worked to put out a massive fire that ignited in a home while a woman lay inside sleeping.

18-year old Justin Coburn and another neighbor tried to get inside the house to rescue the woman inside along with her dogs, and back her car from the driveway out of fear of an explosion.

“It was an instinct to help and I’m a neighbor so why not help”, said Coburn. It turns out his neighbor had already escaped out of a back window, and the dogs got out too.

Firefighters say while admirable the teen’s actions were not the right thing to do.

“If you don’t have training or the equipment to try to enter a home that’s burning to save an individual, you have to wait for the fire department to get there”, said Brent Perkins, spokesman for the Shelby County Fire Department.

Unfortunately, another neighbor may have learned the hard way, the man who tried to get inside with Coburn was standing in front of the home as firefighters arrived and collapsed having what witnesses called a seizure.

Firefighters aren’t sure what sparked the seizure but rushed the man to the hospital where doctors could check him out.